On the mound, ironically, was righty Jeremy Hellickson, who will now be a Franco teammate with the Phillies in 2016.

Hellickson drilled Franco with a fastball on the left wrist in the top of the 1st inning. The pitch would cause a small fracture, one that appeared to end his promising rookie season.

But Franco was able to recover in time to make appearances in the final three games of the season. He even banged a home run at Citizens Bank Park in the 2nd game of an October 3rd doubleheader against the Miami Marlins.

Franco hopefully woke this morning to find a pair of important gifts from Santa, from a baseball perspective, under his Christmas tree.

The first is simply good health. If Franco can stay healthy all year in 2016, have even small performance increases from the players around him, and continue a normal expected developmental growth progression of his own, then we could be looking at a 30+ home run, 100+ RBI season.

No Phillies batter has reached either of those marks since Ryan Howard in the 2011 season.

Another important gift that Franco hopefully found is increased defensive effectiveness.

If it turns out that Franco has to move across the diamond to 1st base eventually, that isn’t the biggest disaster.

But it would close off that position for any other all-bat player who comes along, perhaps a prospect such as Jorge Alfaro or Cornelius Randolph, and would create a hole in the future lineup at 3rd base.

If Franco indeed awoke to find full health and better defense under the tree, those will be gifts for not only himself, but also for the entire Phillies organization and the fan base.

Those would be gifts that keep on giving all through the 2016 season, and well into the future.

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